Fifth (or Sixth) Time's the Charm
by oursolemnhour49
Summary: "And after years and years of asking and asking and asking... I finally said yes!" Well, at any rate, someone said "yes". The many marriage proposals, both traditional and otherwise, between Eugene and Rapunzel. One-shot.


**I need to take this opportunity to wish a merry (and belated) Christmas and happy New Year to my friend Maria, as well as to everyone else out there. And look, I wrote something happy and fluffy! Filled my quota for the year.  
**

**I love Tangled. But alas, I do not own it. No profits made, etc, etc.**

* * *

When Flynn Rider proposed to Rapunzel for the first time, it was sunset of the third day of celebrations for the return of the lost princess. The sky was a brilliant shade of blue streaked with fiery red and gold, beautiful music was playing, and he had downed three gigantic pints of butterscotch beer. Combined with the samples he had taken at differed liquor stalls around the city, those pints could have proved lethal to a man with a lower alcohol tolerance. As it happened, all the drinks killed was his pride.

As the sun was setting and he was on his seventh (or possibly his ninth or tenth) sample, Rapunzel joined him by the fountain. Between her smile and the drinks, he decided that now was the perfect time to ask the question to which he'd put all of five minutes' worth of serious thought.

His "Will you marry me?" came out in a series of sounds best translated as "wuh-mar-me?" and he had to repeat the phrase several times and drop on one knee before she finally figured out what he was trying to say. She'd laughed for quite a while when she did, and then told him he should go back to his room at the local inn.

According to her, Flynn tried to ask her again when he collapsed onto his bed, but he couldn't remember any of what he'd said. If he was honest, that was probably for the best. At least he could maintain a haughty silence when confronted with snickers while nursing his hangover the next morning.

Either way, he was glad she never gave him an answer during that week.

* * *

His second proposal wasn't much more serious than his drunken one, but at least it wasn't embarrassing, and at least he was sober for the asking. Rapunzel's education had been limited by her unorthodox upbringing, and her mother the Queen had been adamant that she would need an education that extended beyond the out-of-date books in the tower.

The palace tutor had discovered that while Rapunzel was a brilliant artist and excellent at astronomy, she was virtually ignorant about everything else. Her knowledge of history and geography was minimal, gleaned from an old children's text that had spent more time discussing myth than actual kingdom politics; her understanding of mathematics was abysmal; and she knew nothing of natural sciences, philosophy, or classic literature.

Rapunzel had enjoyed the prospect of studying at first. She'd come excitedly to Flynn to drag him up to the palace library and shown him every single detail of her desk, how well her pencils and papers were organized, and how to operate the different equipment she would use for her lessons.

He'd tried to act interested and keep from smiling, but apparently he hadn't done a good enough job. Her eyes had narrowed partway through her excited chatter and she gave him a searching look that made him squirm. "You're laughing at me," she said sharply.

"I'm not!" he had protested. "Look, my face is straight as…" He cast around for a metaphor that didn't involve an innuendo. "An arrow," he ended lamely.

"You know, Eugene, you're really lucky you don't have to be a criminal anymore, because you are a terrible liar."

"Okay, look. It's not that I'm not happy for you. It's that I know what it's like to get excited for school. I also know what it's like when it bores you tears. Trust me, princess, the sun is going to be shining and you will give your right foot to be out there, except you can't go because you have to multiply things, and you'll want to throw your textbooks through the window."

She'd been torn between laughing and glaring at him, which was a rather cute expression for her. "I will not!"

Flynn had turned and headed to the door. "Trust me, princess, you will."

And as it turned out, that was exactly what happened. But it wasn't math that made her stir-crazy. As he found out the day he made his second proposal, it was poetry. Which frankly surprised him.

"This is the stuff that you wanted me to bust you out of here for?" he said after looking at the page to which Rapunzel was opening her book.

"Yes! All the sentences are out of order, and okay, yes, I like the rhymes. But the words are all tripping over each other and apparently the only way to tell the different poems apart is to count out the syllables. It takes all the fun out of it."

"I don't know, princess, this stuff isn't bad. I mean, it's about a knight trying to get a lady to marry him. Some girls," he wiggled his eyebrows at her, "would love that kind of thing."

She threw a pencil at him. He caught it with one hand and used it to flip the poetry text to something called "The Questing of the Dreamscape." After reading a few lines, he dropped to one knee and began mangling the poem in question. "Maiden fair with bright gold hair, what must I do to win you? Bring the sea to your door, bring mountains to shore, or force liars to be true?"

Rapunzel laughed and then groaned. "What does something like that even mean?"

"I'm asking what to do to win you, maiden fair with bright gold hair, so I'd guess I'm asking for marriage the long way."

She smiled. "Eugene, if you get me out of here, we've got a deal."

Just at that moment the door opened to reveal a very angry tutor.

Flynn tossed her the book and leapt for the window through which he had come. "Sorry, princess. I'll get a pen through my eye if I stick around here much longer. Besides, I think you're trying to cheat me- I was asking for a chick with bright gold hair!"

* * *

The circumstances surrounding his third marriage proposal made Eugene's memory of it sting and smart for quite some time.

He had spent the better part of a year adjusting to the freedom of no longer hiding from guards, and the first few months of that year, staying out of trouble was easy. He worked odd jobs and visited Rapunzel frequently. When he was working with his hands and talking with the princess, it was easy to keep his mind off other things.

Then the visits had begun to taper off. As Rapunzel's education increased, her duties escalated. Her parents, he knew, were gradually easing her into court life, and with that came greater responsibilities. Rapunzel had to greet visiting dignitaries, learn how to make the right speeches and small talk, and sometimes deal with small disputes within the city.

She was beloved by everyone she met, but it was clear that with so many hours in the day, she could only spare one or two a week for herself.

And with unexpected time and loneliness to face, Flynn found his fingers twitching when he passed by a jeweler's shop or bank. He caught himself examining how long a clerk spent in the back of a store, where the sightlines were from the proprietor's place to the most valuable goods, and during what hours a slight snatch was least likely to be noticed.

He never slipped, but there were many times when his hands would linger over a piece of merchandise and the rush of the job would dance just out of reach on the edges of his mind. More than once he caught a few suspicious looks. After all, Flynn Rider had an extensive and well-documented history.

So he began looking at the few times he could see Rapunzel as a solace, and in hindsight, that was a mistake born of his own struggles in adjusting. At the time, though, it hadn't seemed at all wrong. When he heard her talk wearily about the people she'd had to talk to and the requests she'd had had to handle, it made him feel like he wasn't alone.

Then, after a long and contentious council meeting where a decision she'd made regarding tax breaks for a poorer province had been disputed, Rapunzel had said something that chilled him to the core.

"No matter what I say or do, they just want to prove their point," she'd whispered bitterly. They were curled up by the fire in her little art room, while an icy blizzard roared and rattled the long window at the end of the room. "Sometimes it feels like I'm back in the tower."

He'd looked at her for a moment, taken in her downcast eyes and slumped shoulders, and made a split-second decision. "Then I can get you out."

She stared at him. "What?"

"Listen, if you feel like they're putting you back in the tower, you shouldn't have to stay. We can go."

"Eugene, are you serious?"

He nodded. "Rapunzel… if you think you're back in the tower, then you have every right to leave."

"But I don't, don't you get it? Ever since I came back, I'm not just Rapunzel. I'm a princess, I have things to take care of." She sighed. "Besides, I can't do that to my parents. Not again. Even if I could, where could we go? How'd we even live?"

"I'd take care of you." The words slipped out more forcefully than he intended, and somewhere he began to get the inkling that he should not have started this conversation. "Rapunzel, I'm notorious for being a fugitive. I'm good at living on the run."

"And if I'm with you, how would you explain me?"

"We'd be married," he said without thinking and promptly slapped himself on the forehead. "I mean… we could be whatever you wanted. But I could- if you wanted, we could get married. We could have a life out there, one that's decent. You wouldn't need to worry about all this." He gestured vaguely around the room.

"No," Rapunzel said. Her voice was hard enough to feel like a slap. "I can't do that. I already lived a false life. I won't do that again. Not even with you. Or," she amended swiftly, "Not like that."

Her voice cracked and she swiftly stood, turning her face to the fire. "I care about you," she said after a long silence. "More than I tell you, but believe me, I do. But if that's what it takes for us to be together, we won't be. I've got people who ask me for help and I can't just leave them because I'm tired and feeling lost. I'm tired now, and that's why I said what I did. This life may feel like the tower in that I have boundaries, but it isn't the tower. It never will be. This is just… it's hard, but it's still me living."

She turned to him then, and her green eyes looked as though they had tears in them. "Do you understand that?"

"Yeah," he whispered, feeling ashamed and furious with himself. "I do. I'm sorry, Rapunzel. I shouldn't have asked."

She nodded, and hugged him just as he was about to get up to leave. Surprised, he held her close for a moment and tried not to think about how badly he wanted a life with her- just her and no one else to interfere. But as she herself had pointed out, that would be another kind of prison. If he had been willing to die to keep her from the first, he had no business locking her in a second.

* * *

His fourth marriage proposal never made it past his lips, but in many ways, Eugene was glad it hadn't. For one thing, he had been trembling at the thought of making it, which was deeply embarrassing for a man who'd stolen priceless tiaras without so much as blinking. For another, he realized very soon afterwards that he wanted to get the words out more to speak his mind than to tell Rapunzel that he cared for her.

But at the time, all Eugene could do was worry that he had missed his only chance to speak.

One of the kingdoms immediately to the south had begun to issue several regulations and checkpoints that made merchant travel between the northern and southern kingdoms increasingly difficult. Since most trade relied on those routes, tensions were running high between several kingdoms. In the end, Rapunzel had been chosen as a special ambassador of sorts. Not that any of the official communications called her that; every note, memo, and announcement referred to her impending trip as an official trip of courtesy.

But there was no mistaking that some diplomacy was expected of her.

Eugene felt that they couldn't have chosen a better person for the job; a smile or two from Rapunzel and she'd have every official personage swept away. But the matter of her going away weighed on him in ways he hadn't expected. She would be travelling by mountain roads and in remote areas. He knew- perhaps better than anyone- that bandits tended to live and strike in such areas. And he had been unsuccessful in his efforts to secure a place in the party who would accompany her. Apparently a thief- however pardoned and reformed he might be- would bring down the tone of the expedition.

It had taken Eugene almost a week to realize that he was spending most of his waking moments worrying about Rapunzel. The thought of anything happening to her- anything at all, whether it was bandits or official idiots harassing her- made him alternately sick and ready to punch things. But she was more than capable of taking care of herself, so he kept those thoughts to himself.

All the same, he went to the palace every day in the hopes of being able to see her before she left. But it wasn't until the day before she left that he was able to do more than give her a quick greeting in passing. She had the evening to spend as she wished, and so they had arranged to meet.

Rapunzel met him in the entrance hall, and Eugene was surprised to see that she was dressed in a coat and walking shoes. "I know you just got here," she said in response to his questioning look. "But I really need to go outside; I haven't been all day. Is that all right?"

"Sure thing, princess." He led her outside, but Rapunzel caught his arm as he was about to head for the gate that led to the city.

"I can't go down tonight," she said. Exhaustion hung in every word. "But there's a garden- a sort of walking place- that looks out over the river. It's quiet and it's not too far. Is that-"

"That's fine. I don't know if we ever went there at night before."

She smiled. "I know. The Qu- Mother took us in summer, didn't she? Or was it spring?"

"I think it was summer. Course, with the way the herbs there went to your head, it could have been any season."

Rapunzel shoved him. "It was not that bad!"

"Are we talking about the same garden, princess? The mint alone could have knocked somebody out."

She burst out laughing. "That's not true! Your nose is just too sensitive. Maybe that's why nobody can draw it right."

He clapped a hand to his chest. "You're a cruel fighter, princess. That was uncalled for."

Rapunzel did not look very repentant. Instead she drew a deep breath when they reached the garden, and even Eugene had to admit that in mid-fall, the scent of the desiccated herbs was pleasant.

"All right," he said with a smile. "So it's not as bad as I remember. Still, you gotta admit that all those smells hitting you at once was pretty hard to take at first."

When he got no answer, he turned to see that she had wandered off towards the end of the garden. It was structured like a long paved walkway with walls that rose gradually as it extended over the edge of a steep hill. At the very end of the garden was a sort of cul-de-sac lined with benches. They were interspersed with rose bushes that would bloom beautifully at the right season. In the dark fall night, they looked slightly menacing to Eugene. But Rapunzel was walking towards them as if she did not see them. When she reached the end, she simply stood, staring out over the harbor with a pensive look in her eyes.

"You okay, princess?" Eugene asked after a moment.

"Yes," she said. Her voice was muffled. "It's just- I thought I was doing all right. At talking to people, trying to fix problems- being a princess, you know? And then this trip comes up and I feel like I've forgotten everything. It's like I'm right back where I started. Not knowing anything when there are things out there I should know and I've already lost my temper with my mother twice today and everything feels wrong." She turned to him. "Eugene… I don't know if I'm ready for this. This time, what I do on this trip- it won't affect just me."

He leaned against the wall beside her and covered her hand with his. "You're going to be fine. I know that, okay? You survived everything from me to a crazy sword-wielding horse."

Rapunzel grinned. "I know. Silly of me, right? But…"

Her voice trailed off and Eugene looked at her closely. Then he remembered her slip in saying "Mother" as they had come to the garden. "This is about Gothel, isn't it?"

She froze, then straightened her shoulders. "Yes. I know that the things she said about me not being ready… I know those weren't true. But I don't always believe it. There is a difference," she said quickly.

Eugene hadn't said a word, but she seemed to be trying to convince him. "I know that I can't be as bad as she said, since people seem to think I'm- well, they seem to like me." She gave him a shy smile. "But with something like this- I don't know what I'm doing. And then it all comes back."

For a moment they were quiet, looking out over the harbor. A mist was beginning to creep up across the water, along the edge of the distant forest. The air was growing colder. Rapunzel shrank against Eugene's side and he put his arm around her without thinking as a breeze whistled along the edges of the stone wall.

"You know," he said at last. "When I was growing up, I got attacked by a dog once. It didn't bite me, but it was- oh, I don't know, about the size of Maximus. Give or take a few inches." He left out the fact that the owner had set it on him for stealing food and that he had been twelve at the time. That wasn't exactly the point of the story and it wasn't something she needed to know. "I got away, but for years afterward, I'd leap sky-high if a dog barked. I still don't really like them. But even when I heard a dog bark, it wasn't that particular dog."

Rapunzel took a deep breath. "Okay. I'll remember that." But her hand still shook in his.

He put a hand on her cheek. "Hey, don't worry. You're going to be great. Look at it this way, you'll get to see new places, meet new people. Think of it as a spin-off of your old dream."

She smiled and looked at the ground. "I really wish you could come with me. I know you wanted to travel and see places."

"Maybe next time, princess. Believe me, I wish I could."

"If I still had my hair, I could hide you in it," she said, eyes dancing merrily. "I wish there was a way you could come. I don't like being away from you."

He smiled. "I'm not fond of it either, princess."

When she grinned, the question of staying with her trembled on his lips. He knew how to ask it. There were many variations on what he could have said. The basic question of marriage could have followed after that statement alone. He could have pointed out that if he married her, she would not have to worry about being far from him. He could have told her that he wanted to be there for her, not because she needed help, but because she deserved that much from him. He could have told her the simple truth- that he loved her more than he had ever believed himself capable.

But he held himself back. This was the first of several barking dogs for her, and she should not have to face both them and the question of dealing with him. He was sure Rapunzel could handle both issues at once, but she should not have to and he had no wish to make her.

"Your hands are shaking," Rapunzel said, startling him out of his thoughts. "I'm really sorry, it's getting cold. We should go back."

They did so, one of Eugene's hands hold Rapunzel's, and the other in his pocket keeping track of a silver ring with a bright gold stone.

The next day she left.

* * *

His fifth proposal- or his sixth one, assuming the story about his proposing twice during the festivities was true- had little preparation at all. It didn't match up to any of the dashing seduction scenes he'd read as a teenager, nor did it include any of the beautiful weather that Rapunzel really should have had.

Nevertheless, it was the one to which she said yes.

After her initial trip, Rapunzel had found herself being sent out to many different kingdoms. She had not had full success in securing passages for merchants, but her words had opened the path to negotiations for certain times of the year to be open, as well as lower rates. She had been worried about this, until Eugene reminded her that it was her first political trip and that she did not have to get everything about ruling right at first.

For his part, he was immensely glad whenever she returned from her expeditions.

It was good to see her smile again. It was good to hear her laugh too, though Eugene wished that could have come under any conditions other than her tricking him into trying the sour apples the southern kingdom apparently was famous for. But they would only have a few hours to spare before Rapunzel was called away to listen to the problems some of the newer servants were having with the head housekeeper.

Eugene found as he watched her go that he no longer resented her having to leave. But he wanted to know with certainty that he could go back to her. He wanted Rapunzel to know that she could rely on him for more than his friendship. Whether she needed him to comfort her, to stay by her, make her life, or take her somewhere new, he would be there. He wanted to tell her that. Yet each day he struggled to find the words.

However he began to notice that she was seeking him out more and more. Not just for visits to talk, or the rare days they could spend exploring the castle and town, but to ask him about a knotty problem she had to face. Once Eugene got over his surprise that she would ask his opinion on anything, he would volunteer it. She would argue, which was surprising, but once they'd hashed out a solution, both he and Rapunzel would be grinning like mad.

Some weeks after she got back from her third trip outside the kingdom, the first snow of the year began to fall. Rapunzel was able to secure the entire day for herself, which he only discovered when she showed up at his door covered in a bright blue cloak trimmed with fur and pelted him with a snowball.

"Think of it as an invitation," she said once Eugene had gotten the snow out of his eyes. She'd had to stop laughing first. Though he knew she'd already experienced snow five times since her return, he suspected that snowfall was something Rapunzel would always find magical.

"You know, I think most royalty would use a singing courier or something," he spluttered.

"For a snowball? I wouldn't do that to the poor courier."

"But you'll do it to me? That hurts, princess."

Rapunzel threw another snowball at him. She was wearing her most adorable expression, exasperated laughter. "You're the only one in the entire city who calls me that, you know."

"Consider me your herald. Ten times as attractive with only half the boredom."

Ducking back inside, Eugene seized his coat and stumbled out. The house in which he rented his room was comfortable enough, but it had barely a square foot of yard. It was a terrible place for a snowball fight, and besides, Rapunzel seemed to have used up all the snow. "So tell me, princess, where are we headed?"

She grabbed his hand. "I wanted to head down to the river. It's not frozen yet, so we'd be able to take a boat, right?"

"We could, but where are we going?"

She was quiet for a second, but her footsteps never faltered as they wound their way through the streets.

"I need to go back to the forest." Rapunzel said at last. "Not all the way to the tower. That would take way too long." She took a deep breath. "And I don't think I'm ready yet. I want to go back sometime, just to prove that I'm okay now-"

Eugene stepped in front of her. "Hold up, princess. You are okay now. There's nothing wrong with you. Take it from someone who's really good at recognizing messed up people. You're definitely okay now."

She looked troubled. "I had some nightmares on the way back home. They weren't too bad, but they- one of them reminded me a lot of when I thought you left. When I was alone and the brothers were coming after me. Father said going back to the place might help with that."

"It might," Eugene said cautiously. "With some fears, that can work. I used to be scared of heights and then after prolonged exposure- no problem. Flynn Rider, master thief, could strike from any rooftop." She laughed and he smiled at her. "But your kind of nightmare is a bit different."

"So it might not work?"

"I'm not an expert, princess. You know the nightmare best, so if you think it'll help, we can definitely go. But if it's not- you don't need to follow your dad's advice on this one."

They made their way to the waterfront. Almost every ship, boat, and sailing vessel was drawn up the docks. Their masts looked like skeletal trees in the snow, their shadowy shapes spilling out over the dark water. To Eugene the place looked exceptionally gloomy. Rapunzel was walking slowly, drinking in every sight. Though she no longer sprang from one thing to the next, her joy in every new sight and sound was still palpable.

"I think I'll wait."

He looked at her. She was standing at the edge of the walkway, where there was a gap in the boats that looked out over the river and into the forest at the far end. "It's not that I'm scared of it still," she said quickly.

"Never said you were."

"I know. But it's more like I just don't want to think about it again. The memories- they aren't going away. I don't want to bring them up more than I have to. I have other things to think about, other memories to make. Maybe later, when I'm not in between what happened there," she nodded at the far shore, "maybe then I can go back. But not now. I'm not ready."

"Fair enough. You still want to take a boat?"

"Why?"

Eugene shrugged. "We came all this way, so why not get a look at the first snow from out there?"

"Because it's cold?" Rapunzel laughed. But her eyes were sparkling as she looked around and settled on a small rowing boat. "I think that one could work. And it's ours, so no need to worry about asking anyone."

For his part, Eugene still couldn't shake the feeling that he'd get an arrow or three in his back for setting off in a royal boat with the princess inside. But nothing happened and after a few powerful oar strokes the sounds of the town had died to a distant murmur.

They were both quiet for a moment. Eugene tried to think of something pleasant, like the fact that this was where he had brought her to see the lights. But the only thing on his mind was the bitter cold.

Rapunzel didn't seem to care. She was watching every snowflake fall, and though her eyes still shone with delight, it wasn't the wide-eyed joy of when she'd seen snow for the first time. She looked thoughtful, and perhaps it was his imagination, but she seemed a little sad.

Perhaps she felt his eyes on her. At any rate she turned a little towards him. "Eugene- you said that the best part of a dream that was everything you wanted was finding a new one."

He cast back frantically to remember that conversation. It seemed ages ago, and frankly the entire night still seemed like a dream. Perhaps getting knocked out only a few hours into that night had something to do with that. It certainly would explain why he could barely remember what he said to her.

Rapunzel noticed his confusion. "You do remember that, right? You said it when you took me to see the lanterns."

"A lot of that night's a bit of a blur," he said as lightly as possible. "It was amazing. But the ending kind of killed the mood. And it might have killed a few brain cells too. I don't remember as much of it as I'd like."

She looked utterly bewildered and then her eyes cleared. "Oh. The brothers. They knocked you out when they tied you to that ship."

Eugene quickly found an excuse to check back over his shoulder at the town. "Yeah. It left a bit of a mark."

"And I was hitting you pretty hard before that with the pan the day before," Rapunzel said quietly. "I didn't think about that at all."

"Hey, don't worry about it. Strange man comes into my room, I'd have hit him with an iron pan too."

She grinned. "I think you would have pretended not to be home and then stolen his shirt and his shoes when he wasn't looking."

"That definitely would be more entertaining. Useless, because what would I do with the clothes? But definitely amusing."

They were quiet for a moment. Rapunzel reached out and trailed a finger in the water, which had to be icy at this time of year. She didn't seem bothered by it, though Eugene did notice she wrapped her hands in her cloak as soon as she could. At last she looked at him again. "You said that we got to find new dreams when our old ones ended. And the thing is… it's been a few years. I've changed a lot. I've found new things."

She looked down and swallowed hard. Without thinking Eugene covered her hand with his. He almost lost an oar as a result, which made Rapunzel smile. For himself, he was glad of the distraction as they gathered the oars into the boat. A terribly cold pit had opened in his chest the moment she said she had changed. There could only be one place this conversation was going.

And that was okay, he told himself. Dreams changed. They had to, or everyone would go half-mad before the age of twenty. Part of growing up was learning to realize that your dreams didn't need to lose their luster because they couldn't come true.

But all the same, he felt a surge of terror at the thought. She was so much more than a dream to him and yet he had no more power to keep her than he had the power to stay asleep in genuine dreaming.

When they had steadied the oars, Rapunzel went on again. "Anyway, what I'm trying to say- not very well- is that my last dream hasn't changed. You're still it. And the thing is- now that I've changed, I know what I want from it. You are- you've been the only thing that was constant from when I left to when I came. That is- you've changed, but you've been there. You've helped me. And you make me laugh and I like you, I like knowing you."

She straightened her cloak and began to twirl a finger around a lock of short brown hair. Her words had started in rapid, nervous jerks, but now her voice was steady. "I want you with me. Not just as a friend, not just for visits when I come home. I want you to be with me for the rest of my life. I have people who love me. But I can't get away from what happened to me in that tower, and I can't just forget how I was raised. I still struggle, and sometimes the memories come back in a way that I can't explain unless the person has seen them."

Her green eyes met his, unflinching. "I want someone who loves me and who knows- who got to see, just a little, what my life was like before. And I think- I hope- that you might feel the same."

Eugene could not bring himself to speak. Rapunzel reached out and took his hand in hers. "Eugene- I know that you care about me. If you want that- if your dream has changed, I want to know. If you still… well, if you still dream about me, I want to know that too." She smiled shyly.

For a moment his breath felt caught in chest, and for a moment he cursed the boat. He wanted to take her and kiss her until neither of them could breathe, then run through the streets shouting. This rush was far more potent and frightening than he ever thought relief and joy could be.

Keeping hold of her hand, he fumbled in his pocket for the ring he had kept there since her departure for the south. Once he secured it, he took a deep breath. "Rapunzel, when I was in that tower- I realized what I wanted my dream for you to be. It was for you to be happy. You deserved that, more than anything else. That dream- it came true, obviously. So I found another."

She stiffened and the sudden pain in her eyes made him toss out the suspense he'd been planning to inflict on her. "I still dream about you," he said quickly. "And I still want that first dream to come true. So if you really think an ex-conman and thief at your side for the rest of your life will make you happy- then I think I have just what you need."

He took out the ring and put it gently into her outstretched palm. "Rapunzel, will you marry me?"

Her answer was an embrace that almost knocked them out of the boat. But the kiss afterwards made the risk more than worth it.

"So I take it she says yes?" Eugene whispered after a moment.

Rapunzel pulled back to her seat and slipped the ring on her finger. "I do," she said with a smile so brilliant it could have lit the entire harbor. Then she laughed. "I guess we both have to find new dreams now."

"Well, I don't know about you, but mine is to get out of the cold."

She shivered. "And mine is telling my parents without it being too much of a fuss."

Eugene winced. "Actually scratch that, I'm changing mine to yours."

They pulled up to the dock and retied the boat. Rapunzel grabbed his hand and squeezed. Her fingers were freezing, but Eugene doubted the gesture was because of the cold. "Ready to go chase another dream?" she asked.

There were many snarky responses he could have made. But he settled for the first answer that came to mind.

"With you, princess? Always."


End file.
